Atari

My cat Atari died suddenly on thursday. I miss him. I know he's still here and I'll see him again, but I miss him so much. He was my reason to get up and out of bed. I have other cats too and a dog but he needed to be given water through a dropper. He was blind in one eye. He was special and he was my world. Coming home from a hard day at work and hearing his sweet little meows really made up for things being the way they are some times. He sent me a rainbow Friday. I was talking to my friend about him, and what I think happens when we are gone, and I was wishing I had a sign that what I believe is true, and that he's ok. My mom was in the store and I was in the car in the parking lot and I looked up and I saw a rainbow. It had been raining all day on Thursday, rained through the night I had to come home and bury him, and rained Friday morning here. I'm not a religious person, I don't believe in a Christian heaven and I don't believe in hell, but I believe there's something.

He had kidney issues. At some point in his life he was going to have to have his blind eye removed, but he was also a case of 'as long as he's comfortable', because we knew his outlook wasn't good. I keep his little dropper in the bathroom, by the sink. I still fill it up every morning like I'm going to give him water, count the amount of times I fill it up and squirt the water out into the sink. Ten times was enough most mornings. We worked up from three, to six, to ten as he got bigger from a baby kitten. I gave him water when I got home. I gave him water before I went to bed. Sometimes I think he was fooling me and he drank out of the bowl just fine. But he liked me to give him water. He liked warm water. Not cold. The other cats watch me now like they don't understand what I'm doing.

I held him as he went. I didn't want him to suffer. I wasn't home when my cat Yuki died in 2020. She had been in and out of the vet all week. She was 12 years old, and suddenly had diabetes 2 weeks after my cat Kisa died. Kisa was 16. I couldn't call out of work the morning Yuki died. It's one of the things that I will always regret.

I had plans to take Atari with me when I go to Disney next year. I was going to leave him in the hotel room, but I couldn't trust that anyone would give him the amount of care that he needed. I was really looking forward to that.

Anyway if you read this and want to share what you think happens when we go or whatever I love to hear your ideas. I like to talk about what might happen. Ten years ago I thought it was nothing. And that when people we loved died it was just a comforting idea that they hung around and watched us and waited for us. I've lost family members since then. I've had experiences that most might brush off since then and most of the time I try and rationalize them too.